Previews

Destroy All Humans

We take a look at the game that let's you wreak havoc on the denizens of the 1950's.

Spiffy:

Great humor pokes fun at 50's sci-fi movies; excellent physics system; mental powers make the game feel more wide-open.

Iffy:

One demo level does not a game make ... but it's looking good so far.

While I've got a soft spot in my heart for brilliant films like Beetlejuice and Ed Wood, if I had to pick a Tim Burton movie to spend the rest of my life watching, I think I'd have to choose Mars Attacks. While it's got plenty of problems, nearly everything is offset by the fact that the Martian invaders are downright awesome. From their grating voices (Ack ack, ack ACK ACK!) and bulbous, goo-filled heads to the unmitigated joy they feel when frying unsuspecting humans, everything about them was picture perfect.

My love for these creepy little buggers was what drove me to seek out Destroy All Humans while I was at a THQ event last night. Everything I've seen from the game looks like it was taken directly from a 1950's sci-fi movie, all the way down to the theremin-heavy score that's reminiscent of some of Bernard Herrmann's classic compositions. However, while most of those movies used an alien invasion to represent the tides of Communism, the little green men in Pandemic's newest title having nothing to do with the Red Menace. They simply came to earth to chew gum and harvest brain stems. Guess what, though, folks? They're all out of gum!

When I finally managed to get into the game's demo area, I was given a quick breakdown by some of the creative minds behind the project. Destroy All Humans puts you in the shiny space boots of Cryptosporidium 137, an alien that looks exactly like the ones that have been anal-probing people like Whitley Streiber and Dana Scully for years. You know the type: slimy gray skin, large black eyes, and an insatiable thirst for carnage. Our buddy Crypto comes from the planet Furon, whose citizens have been propagating for thousands of years by cloning themselves. Unfortunately (for us), the Furons just realized that all of this replicating has weakened their basic DNA, so they decide to harvest some fresh DNA in an effort to build it back up again.

Where are they going to find untainted DNA? Why, on Earth, of course! It turns out that our Furon overlords visited earth eons ago, leaving behind a bit of their genetic material to kickstart the evolutionary process. Now they want it back, and they aren't going to let anything stop them. Well, that's not exactly true. Turns out they already sent an operative (your brother Crypto-136) to Earth for harvest, but he had the misfortune to land in Roswell, New Mexico. So, in addition to saving the future of your race, you've also got to track down your long lost brother before the men in white coats can dissect him.

The game began with my saucer touching down in a rural area, and I set off to chat with the locals. Through a series of brief tutorials (you're in constant contact with the mothership), I learned that I was able to read the minds of anyone I came across. This is where the game is really able to show off its slightly twisted humor, since most people would never say the things that they're thinking. Mind reading is also the most basic of Crypto's impressive mental powers, all of which are accessed by holding the left trigger. Once you've got the menu open, you can utilize the power you want by pressing the appropriate face button.